Can shipping achieve zero carbon by 2050?

EARLIER this year US President Joe Biden committed to achieving zero carbon emissions from shipping by 2050. At the time there were comments from outside the industry to the effect that doing so would be easily achievable and was an "easy win" for politicians.

US climate envoy John Kerry was quoted by Reuters as saying: "The technologies that we need to decarbonise shipping are known to us so they need investment and they need to be scaled up."

Set against that, most people working within the industry see achieving zero carbon as being a massive challenge.